Call Steve Harvey

February 2018

MUMBAI, INDIA

Following the death of their father in 2002, billionaires Anil and Mukesh Ambani struggled to cooperate in running the family business, so their mother brokered a deal in which Mukesh was given charge of the oil and gas interests; Anil, the telecommunications and power operations. Then Mukesh launched his own telecommunications company, Reliance Jio, to compete with Anil’s Reliance Communications. Mukesh caused turmoil in the telecom sector, investing profits from his oil business in Jio so he could offer customers the first six months of 4G service free. The deal attracted 100 million subscribers and left existing providers slashing costs and merging to try to stay competitive. Anil ended up putting his assets, including bandwidth, 100,000 miles of optic fiber, and 43,000 cell phone towers, up for bid in what was described as a legal and transparent process. And, as “luck” would have it, Mukesh submitted the winning bid, buying his brother out on their father’s birthday. Anil will use the proceeds to start paying down $7 billion in debt while retaining his data center, IT services, and real estate holdings.